Weight could be a factor in treating rheumatoid arthritis

People who are overweight when they are diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis are less likely to be able to control the disease well in its early stages than people of a healthy weight, according to a new study.

In rheumatoid arthritis, the body’s immune system attacks its own connective tissue, destroying the cartilage that protects joints. The condition leads to stiffness, joint swelling and whole-body fatigue.

Unlike the more common osteoarthritis, or “wear-and-tear” arthritis, which affects people as they get older, rheumatoid arthritis can happen at any age. It affects less than one percent of adults, or 1.3 million people in the U.S., according to the American College of Rheumatology.

Most patients will experience improvement when they start treatment, but only a minority will go into remission, said Dr. Paul-Peter Tak of the Academic Medical Center at the University of Amsterdam, who was not part of the new research.

The study included almost 500 adults in the early stages of rheumatoid arthritis between 2006 and 2009.

Researchers reviewed a Swedish rheumatology database that included each patient’s self-reported height and weight at diagnosis and information on how the disease had progressed over the next six months.

How Weight Lifting Can Help Rheumatoid Arthritis Lift weights with sore joints? Yeah, right. You might think weight lifting would make arthritis worse. But think again. The benefits of strength training for arthritis are just being recognized. Weight lifting can help people with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) function better and reduce soreness, stiffness and pain.

A 2009 study from Great Britain shows that a strength-training program called progressive resistance training (PRT) may improve physical function in people with mildly disabling, well-controlled RA. PRT involves periodically increasing the amount of weight used during an exercise so benefits continue as muscle strength improves.

Data from participants in the high-intensity - not high-impact - program dispelled the long-held notion that joints affected by RA needed more rest and protection than movement. None of the participants experienced a flare, and all improved endurance, gained lean body mass and lost abdominal, back and chest fat. Improve­ments also were seen in people with cachexia - so much so that a larger trial is nearing completion to determine the effectiveness of PRT as a treatment for cachexia along with medications that control RA.

In the 12-week study, participants three times a week performed three sets of eight of each of the following exercises: biceps curl, triceps pushdown, chest press, seated row, leg press, leg extension, leg curl and standing calf raise.

“The novelty of the study was not in the kind of exercises used - because over the course of a long-term training program, the exercises performed must be changed regularly, anyway - but rather in seeing the frequency and intensity at which people with RA could work,” says Samuele Marcora, PhD, exercise physiologist at the University of Wales in Bangor, United Kingdom.